EXCLUSIVES
Developers are Key to Success of Windows Phone 7
When Apple launched the iPhone, Microsoft’s Steve Ballmer ridiculed the lack of a keyboard. Little did he know this gadget would become the best selling phone in a league of its own. In an attempt to stay on top of the game, Microsoft released a Windows phone that disappeared just as soon as it had arrived. With the new Windows 7, due out in October, Microsoft is looking forward to redeem itself and reinforce the company’s standing in the technology space. What gives Windows 7 an edge is its ability to run on a wide range of devices unlike the iPhone.
Adobe Flash 10.1 Speeds Up Mac and Shows Love
In the midst of the Apple vs. Adobe war, a phoenix seems to have risen from the ashes. Enter Flash 10.1 on Mac OS X. After years of poor performance and the long raging Apple and Adobe battle, hardware acceleration for Adobe Flash finally got the green signal. The Adobe team seems to have really heard out the developer community this season. With the 10.1 release they have aimed to correct several of the previous Flash glitches. Adobe says developers can look forward to no more bogging down of browsers, CPU utilization reduction (up to two-thirds when GPU hardware acceleration is active) and eliminating the iPhone it runs on a gamut of handheld devices.
Eclipse's Largest Gravy Train Helios Arrives
Amongst the colossal additions and falls that 2010 has witnessed, the Helios technology from the Eclipse line is the largest and includes 39 different project teams, over 33 million lines of code and the work of 490 committers. Codenamed Helios, the current release train comes loaded with developer delights comprising projects based on open source, Java based Eclipse IDE, and more features including improved support in the JavaScript Development Tools project (JSDT) including a JavaScript debug framework, Eclipse Marketplace Client that makes it easier to find and install Eclipse solutions, the new support for Git, a popular distributed version control (DVCS), and so on.
Google IDE for the Non-coder Android Developer
Good news for the non-coder developer - Google has released the App Inventor for Android. The dragging and dropping of visual blocks of code enable the developer to build applications. App Inventor "makes it easy for anyone -- programmers and non-programmers, professionals and students -- to create mobile applications for Android-powered devices".
Java, Open Source, SOA & WS* on Top of Indian Developer's Radar
Himanshu Goyal heads Academic Initiative, developerWorks and Globalization initiatives for IBM India/South Asia. Under these initiatives, he is responsible to evangelize, skill and certify on the IBM Software to Engineering Students, Faculties, Developers and senior IT professionals in the Industry. Under Globalization he is responsible for the availability of IBM software in local languages in India/South Asia. Himanshu spoke to DeveloperMarch about the 27-city road show ‘Develothon 2010’geared towards skilling the Indian developers on emerging technologies and trends, the mission for developerWorks going forward and the technologies that is keeping Indian developers excited in 2010.
Google Coming to your Idiot Box?
Google is set to invade your living room as the company puts its finishing touches on technology that lets software developers build applications for televisions in much the same way as they do for smartphones. Google is planning to unveil an Android-based 'Google TV' at the Google I/O conference, which open in May, San Francisco. Intel and Sony are also involved in the platform, which is rumoured to be open source, in keeping with the Android operating system. "(Google) hopes the move will spur the same outpouring of creativity that consumers have seen in applications for cellphones."
Symbian to Fully Endorse HTML 5
Symbian has released a set of web application development tools for the recently open-sourced Symbian platform. These tools aim to aid the development, distribution and installation of web applications on Symbian devices, using technologies such as HTML, JavaScript and CSS. "Symbian Foundation is fully embracing HTML5. Symbian^4 will take a big step forward and we’re encouraging our contributors to move as fast as possible. Check this out for a snapshot of the progress," says the Development Tools Manager at Symbian Foundation.
SugarCRM Now on Windows Azure
Microsoft and SugarCRM began working together in 2006 to deliver Sugar applications on top of Microsoft technology. SugarCRM supports IIS as well as Active Directory, Microsoft SQL Server, Microsoft Office Outlook and Microsoft Exchange Server. The two companies have continued to collaborate as part of the Interop Vendor Alliance. In August, SugarCRM announced Sugar Community Edition on the Microsoft Web Platform, a framework for developing, deploying and hosting Web applications.
C Programming Knocks out Java from #1 Position
After more than 4 years C is back at position number 1 in the TIOBE index. The scores for C have been pretty constant through the years, varying between the 15% and 20% market share for almost 10 years. So the main reason for C's number 1 position is not C's uprise, but the decline of its competitor Java. Java has a long-term downward trend. It is losing ground to other languages running on the JVM. An example of such a language is JavaFX script that is now approaching the top 20.
RIM Updates for Java and Web Tools Make Blackberry App Development Easier
The BlackBerry Java Plug-In for Eclipse v1.1 and the BlackBerry Web Plug-in v2.0 offer new capabilities that make it even easier to create feature-rich applications. The BlackBerry Widget SDK (Software Development Kit) v1.0 and the BlackBerry(R) Java SDK v5.0, which includes more than 20,000 APIs, provide unparalleled access to BlackBerry(R) smartphone hardware features, native BlackBerry software applications and other unique system capabilities of the BlackBerry Application Platform.
3PAR Unveils Utility Storage in India
3PAR, a global provider of utility storage, has launched its first sales and customer service office in India and has named Arvind Khurana as country manager. This move into India is intended to position 3PAR to meet growing demand for technologies to support cloud computing, the virtual datacenter,green IT initiatives, and enhanced infrastructure agility in an economy that has been expanding in the midst of a worldwide recession.
Security Architectures for the Rich Web
While Web 2.0 technology and services have been common in the public sphere for a number of years, their uptake into the Enterprise has been relatively slow. Rich Internet Applications...
Security Architectures for the Rich Web While Web 2.0 technology and services have been common in the public sphere for a number of years, their uptake into the Enterprise has been relatively slow. Rich Internet Applications... The Entire Game Should Move Onto the GPU, says Rev Lebaredian As the computing functionality and horsepower of GPUs has grown over the last few years, the role of the GPU is rapidly expanding to game tasks beyond rasterization-based graphics. Now... SOA with SQL Server A key component to any distributed architecture built with SOA methodologies in mind is the database infrastructure. Service Oriented Database Architecture (SODA) is much easier to... Fermi Graphics Chip is Direct X 11 Done Right, says Nvidia's Ashu Rege and Keita Iida The computer game and hardware industry is advancing at a rapid pace, both in terms of technical innovation and sales. Nvidia is working towards expanding the market reach for games and... Picking the Right Technology for Enterprise RIA We are entering an era of Rich Internet Applications (RIA), and many enterprise development managers are facing the dilemma - which way to go - remain with tried and true Java or .NET or... A Lap Around Visual Studio Team System Wonder why 70% of projects are classified as failed projects? Working in silos does not help projects succeed. Learn how Visual Studio Team System 2008 helps break the walls across team... A Game without Sound is a Story Told with No Emotion It is common among writers, story tellers and even the audience/game players to believe that visuals alone can tell a story well. While visuals can bring life to the story and connect to...